


Pop.

by Skyepilot



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Bubble Wrap, F/M, Flirting, Fluff and Smut, Friends to Lovers, Innuendo, Insecurity, Kink Negotiation, Light BDSM, Male-Female Friendship, Sexual Content, Sexual Humor, Trauma, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-29 23:22:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14483460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skyepilot/pseuds/Skyepilot
Summary: For Cousycomfort. Anyway, I made a fic about an "incorrect quote" gifset. Daisy wants to wrap Coulson in bubble wrap and put him in a cave to keep him safe.





	Pop.

It feels like, somehow, Daisy is always saving him.

Not in a way that’s easy to put into words, although she did just _save_ save him. This time from the alien ship.

It’s like she is always saving him, a little piece at a time. Each one new and different, and he’s unspeakably grateful. Words would not be nearly enough, but he tries.

“I’m sorry you keep finding yourself in this position, but, I’m grateful for the rescue.”

She smiles at him, the edge of her lips curling first as she starts to remove her gauntlets in what used to be his office on the Z1.

“I guess my next move is to roll you in bubble wrap and hide you in a cave?” she says bluntly.

He’s not sure what to say to that. A quick mental check to make sure he even heard it correctly. Somehow, his own thoughts not terribly reassuring.

“Come again?” he asks, tilting his head, digging his hands into his pockets.

“I meant,” she starts, lifting her hand to explain with a gesture, “To keep you safe, because-“ she pauses, watching him slow to react. “ _Right_.”

Fighting the smirk and their now mutual embarrassment, he looks towards the floor to spare them both, or let it pass, whichever happens quickest.

“I mean, who doesn’t like bubble wrap?” she announces, making it clear she’s way overthinking all of this.

His ears feel hot, the idea coming alive in his mind, and he dares glance up at her and her piqued expression, as she chews at her bottom lip.

“You do, apparently?” he blurts out.

“Are you okay, Phil?” He hears her voice drop, watches her arms cross, her arms still half-wearing her superhero braces, like she is becoming Daisy again, instead of Quake. “You look a little red in the face.”

He wonders when this exactly happened, too. When Daisy saving him had taken on such mythical proportions in his mind.

Was it before today? It had to be.

This time, eye contact is out of the question. He swallows and he can feel her walking towards him.

“I-I like bubble wrap,” he stammers, before he hears the door shut behind him.

When he does turn around, she’s gone.

  
+++

  
He presses the plastic between his fingers until it pops.

The memory of a conversation. That feels like it was ages ago, but in reality-

“I should’ve taken your advice,” he says with a sigh, sifting through the box for anything useful.

“About what?” she asks, stopping her own search in a crate and moving in closer to the pile of his collectibles they’ve recovered as they scour Hale’s former base.

Some of them are broken, in pieces. It’s fitting, he thinks. It hurts him in a way he didn’t expect. They’re just things, after all. Pieces of a life that seem very distant now. One that he has no choice except to start with a clean slate.

He should be more grateful.

“Wrapping me up. Sticking me in a cave,” he chuckles, a bit morbidly, looking at the broken Asgardian object in his hand.

“I need you here, not in a cave,” she tells him quietly, watching him frown at the object, then start to wrap it. “However, if you’d like to be assigned to cave duty, I’m sure there is a secret SHIELD cave somewhere we don’t know about yet.”

He gives her a droll look and simply pops more of the bubble wrap. “You saved the world. That should excuse you from clean up duty."

“I thought you could use some help,” she tells him, reaching out her hand to touch the bubble wrap in his. _Pop._ “Maybe you don’t need my help after all.”

Oh no. He needs her alright. He just doesn’t deserve her. None of them do. When she looks at him like that, he wonders what she is seeing. When he looks at her, he sees-

_Pop._

He is as broken as the object in his hand. Incapable of describing, in simple words, the depth of his feelings.

What she needs right now is so much more important than his insecurities. _Pop._  
.  
“Someone has to clean it up," she tells him. "But you shouldn't have to do it alone.” _Pop._

It breaks his heart, how Daisy still has more to give. It also fills him with an enormous amount of hope. The kind he's waited his whole life to find, and it's right in front of him.

If only he could- _Pop._

He's still here. Alive. He can be here for her. The way she has been for him. Let her need him.

“Who doesn’t like bubble wrap?” he asks, and watches her raise an eyebrow.

_Pop._

  
+++

  
“I like how literal this is turning out to be.”

“Lift.”

“Is this something you’ve thought about?” he asks her, raising his hips and turning over his shoulder to watch her pull the plastic tight across his body.

It pops a little from the strain, and he curls his fingers into the top sheet on the bunk, sucking in air.

“Not until you made a point of it,” she answers directly, concentrating, then sitting back on the bed to look at her work appreciatively. “Of course, _after_ that-“

She reaches out her hand and smacks it against his ass, listening to the pop of the bubble wrap covering it.

“Kinky,” he says, voice thick with approval and a waiver of careful control.

“I think I’ve improved on your dirty thought, Phil," she says proudly, getting up from the bed and standing beside it.

“It-it didn’t start out as a dirty thought,” he promises, as he watches her pull out another long sheet of the wrap. "I didn't want you to think I was useless."

“But you got there pretty quick,” she tells him, lowering her voice a bit, leaning over to talk in his ear, like their conversation is now private. Naughtier.

“I thought it was just in my head. Can you blame me?" he asks, wanting to wiggle, feeling the bubble wrap squeeze him in all the right ways. "That someone like you would ever-“

He lowers his hips back to the bed while the plastic creaks and rustles.

“Are you having doubts?” she shrugs. "Because I can definitely sto-“

“Please. No doubts," he interrupts her. "The opposite of doubts,” he says, staring at the ceiling, concentrating, as her hand caresses his bare back.

Daisy's fingers on his skin, the power of Quake in them, but the gentleness is Daisy's, and he feels so greedy.

“Good,” she says, leaning over to kiss his bare shoulder. "I need you here with me."

He closes his eyes at the tenderness of it, understanding, and shutting out his own insecurities.

She slides her hands beneath his chest, and starts the wrap over his heart, then around, and around. He doesn't feel helpless, or useless, as she talks him through it.

It's easy to move with her, to trust her hands. To give her every word and sound of gratitude he can manage, until she's left holding him up.

Again.

When he tries to curl himself up against her, the bubble wrap complains noisily, and it makes her laugh, as she lays down on her side next to him, watching.

"I just wanted to keep you safe," she says, suddenly serious, tucking her hands underneath her head. "The world was ending, and I wanted-"

" _Daisy_."

"Does that make me selfish?" she asks him, touching the plastic where it's over his heart, wiggling her finger in between until it's touching his scar.

"No," he says, reaching out a hand to caress her hair. "It makes you loved."

He moves forward, kissing her with the same tenderness she has shown him. He can feel her move in closer to him.

Closer than she has ever been.

_Pop._


End file.
